What a Business Central partner actually does
A Business Central partner can do three separate jobs, and it pays to know which ones you are hiring for.
- Reseller. Microsoft sells Business Central online only through Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) partners, so your subscription always comes through a reseller. The reseller is your first line of support, works in your tenant through delegated admin (GDAP) roles, and needs an Advanced or Premier support plan to escalate to Microsoft.
- Implementer. Setup, data migration, extensions and training. Microsoft's support plans do not include assisted training, so training is something you buy from a partner.
- Support after go-live. Microsoft expects the partner to schedule updates, watch telemetry and keep customizations and apps working. Business Central gets two major updates a year, and every extension has to keep up with them.
Some firms do all three. Others implement and work alongside your reseller. Either can work, as long as everyone knows who owns what after go-live.
What Business Central costs
Microsoft's US list prices, per user per month and paid yearly, as shown on Microsoft's pricing page on 14 September 2026:
- Essentials: $80 per user per month.
- Premium: $110 per user per month. Premium adds manufacturing and service management.
- Team Members: $8 per user per month, for people who mainly look things up and approve.
Microsoft raised Essentials from $70 and Premium from $100 in late 2025, with existing subscriptions moving at renewal. Each subscription includes one production and three sandbox environments.
Implementation is billed separately by the partner, and published ranges vary widely. Rand Group, a Business Central partner, quotes $25,000 to more than $250,000, and a Forrester study commissioned by Microsoft modeled $50,000 of partner services for a 115-user company with $50 million in revenue. Treat any number you read online as a sanity check, not a quote.
The Microsoft credentials worth checking
- Solutions Partner designation. Earned on Microsoft's partner capability score through a solution path. Business Central partners qualify through the Business Applications path.
- The badge name changed in 2026. Microsoft's August 2026 partner announcements renamed the customer-facing badge for both the Business Applications and Modern Work paths to Solutions Partner for AI Business Solutions, with the same requirements. Modern Work covers Microsoft 365, not Dynamics, so ask which path a partner qualified through. If a firm calls itself a Solutions Partner for Business Applications, that is the earlier name of the same designation.
- Small and Midsize Business Management specialization. This is the specialization tied to Business Central. Microsoft requires the designation plus a record of new Business Central deployments and user growth, five certified Business Central functional consultants and a Business Central consulting offer on Microsoft Marketplace.
- Individual certifications. Ask how many certified Business Central consultants will work on your project, not how many the firm employs.
To verify any of these, look the firm up in Microsoft's Connect with partners directory. The badges there are awarded by Microsoft. The description and tags are written by the partner, and so are the credentials on our listings, which is why each one gets a star and a pointer to Microsoft to confirm it.
Moving from Dynamics NAV or GP
If you are coming from NAV or GP, Microsoft's support dates set the pace.
- NAV. Extended support for NAV 2016 ended on 14 April 2026. NAV 2017 ends on 11 January 2027 and NAV 2018 on 11 January 2028. Microsoft's migration guidance offers two routes: upgrade, converting C/AL customizations to AL extensions, or reimplement on Business Central and bring the data across. Older versions pass through on-premises Business Central releases on the way, and Microsoft recommends a dry run in a sandbox first.
- GP. Microsoft ends GP enhancements, tax updates and support at the end of 2029, and security patches in April 2031. GP 2015 and later can use Microsoft's cloud migration tools to move to Business Central.
If your website or B2B store is connected to NAV or GP, that integration has to move too. Our NAV and AX, GP and Business Central integration guides cover what changes.
Questions to ask before you sign
- Credentials. Which Solutions Partner designation do you hold, through which path, and do you hold the Small and Midsize Business Management specialization?
- People. Which certified consultants will work on our project, and can we see their experience?
- Reseller and support. Will you be our CSP reseller? Which Microsoft support plan do you have, and which delegated admin roles will you ask for in our tenant?
- Updates. Who keeps our extensions working through each major update, and is that in the support fee?
- Migration. Will you upgrade our NAV customizations or reimplement, and how many dry runs are in the plan?
- Budget. What is fixed price, what is time and materials, and what happens if data cleanup takes longer than planned?
- Integrations. Who connects Business Central to our website, B2B store, EDI and shipping, and through which API?
How this directory works
ProjectThunder is not a Business Central reseller and does not implement Business Central. We build the B2B storefronts and integrations that connect to it, which means we work next to Business Central partners and may work with firms listed here on client projects.
Listings appear in alphabetical order, and the credentials on each are stated in the member's own words. If something on a listing is out of date, tell us and we will check it with the member.
